Birdwell Gets Life, No Parole His Attorney Promises Appeal Of Sentence For Role In Freeman Murders. Da: Punishment Fits The Crime.

July 19, 1996|by DEBBIE GARLICKI, The Morning Call

Nelson "Ben" Birdwell III kept his silence yesterday as a judge officially sentenced the 19-year-old to life in prison with no chance of parole for participating in the slaying of his uncle in the Freeman family murders.

Birdwell received an additional 4-1/2 to 10 years in prison for conspiring with admitted murderers Bryan and David Freeman, his cousins, and hindering their apprehension after the deaths of the Freeman brothers' mother, father and younger brother.

"Mr. Birdwell, do you understand that sentence?" asked Lehigh County President Judge James N. Diefenderfer.

Defense lawyer Richard Makoul appeared confident that prosecutors haven't seen the last of Birdwell and said there are "very substantial" appeal issues. He said he advised Birdwell not to speak because of the appeal, which will be filed in state Superior Court within 30 days.

Makoul said the strongest issue is the court's refusal to move the trial to another county because of pretrial publicity, which he contends prevented Birdwell from getting a fair trial in Lehigh County.

Birdwell of Allentown was 18 when he was charged with helping the Freemans to kill their parents, Dennis and Brenda, and 11-year-old brother Erik in the family's home at 1635 Ehrets Lane, Salisbury Township.

After Birdwell's April trial, one juror discussed the emotional toll of deciding his fate. "The first day I walked into the courtroom ... I did not see a 19-year-old young man," said Janice A. Cavanaugh, a Coopersburg mother of two. "I saw the face of a 5-year-old little boy who somehow got lost."

The mother in her wanted to believe in his innocence, but as the case progressed, the evidence mounted, she said.

"The last day I walked into the courtroom before deliberation, I now saw a 19-year-old young man who was being tried for murder, the murder of a family, including an innocent, defenseless 11-year-old boy," Cavanaugh said.

Jurors shed tears, not only for Erik, his parents and their loved ones, but for the loss of Birdwell's young life, she said.

After the February 1995 killings, committed with a knife, a pickax handle, an aluminum baseball bat and a metal exercise bar, news accounts examined the brothers' volatile relationship with their parents and troubles as juveniles who shaved their heads and got tattoos of swastikas and Nazi salutes.

Confronted with victims that had been stabbed and beaten, a bloodstained house and different statements from Bryan, 18, and David, 17, police tried to piece together which of the defendants killed which victims.

The straightforward hearing yesterday almost turned into a mini-retrial as Makoul questioned the evidence against Birdwell. District Attorney Robert Steinberg responded that he wouldn't relitigate the case with Makoul.

Birdwell was as much a participant as the Freeman brothers, Steinberg said, avoiding a repeat of the evidence.

The jury convicted Birdwell of first-degree murder in the beating of Dennis Freeman but acquitted him in the murders of Brenda and Erik.

David Freeman pleaded guilty to killing his father with the baseball bat and Bryan admitted stabbing his mother. No one admitted killing Erik.

Jurors must have believed that Birdwell somehow was an accomplice in his uncle's death, Makoul said. A juror interviewed after the trial said minute spots of Dennis' blood on Birdwell's shirt convinced the jury he took part in the killing.

Diefenderfer noted that an accomplice to a killing can be found guilty of the same degree of murder as the person wielding the weapon.

The question yesterday was whether Birdwell should get life plus consecutive sentences for the other crimes. "These are some of the most brutal offenses that this county has ever seen," Steinberg said.

Makoul argued that life in prison would be sufficient. "When's he supposed to serve consecutive sentences? In a second lifetime?" he later asked.

Additional time is being sought for "political reasons," he said. "This is not political," Steinberg retorted. "This is brutality and the worst kind."

Steinberg referred to the jury's written comment on the verdict slip that Birdwell serve life "with no chance of parole."

"This jury wanted to make sure that this particular defendant would never get out of prison, that no governor would commute his sentence, and he would never see the light of day again," Steinberg said.